


An Ancient Evil

by Beryll (Rynthjan)



Series: Sir Yaden [8]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Nabucco, Psychics, Slavery, Violence, alien artefact, p2, phoenix empire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-02
Updated: 2013-04-08
Packaged: 2017-12-07 06:20:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/745285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rynthjan/pseuds/Beryll
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While Sir Yaden and his family are still busy settling in at their new home, a new mission sends Yaden and Ivan to Nabuco to battle an unknown menace which threatens to overtake a military base.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Set in the year 5038 of the Phoenix Empire timeline

"This is really annoying." Colin growled.

Yaden and Shawn nodded in silence. All three of them were peering into the huge and very empty pool that dominated one of the terraces close to the mansion. They had spent most of the morning hauling out all the junk that had accumulated in it over the years the island had been ownerless. Then Yaden had helped Shawn repair the pump which mostly consisted of him handing Shawn the correct tools, while Colin made them some lunch.

Now with a platter of sandwiches devoured they had activated the pump. And nothing at all happened.

Shawn rubbed his face, smearing motor oil from his cheek to his brow. "There must be a blockage somewhere in the pipes." He guessed. "But I don't even have an idea where they run through."

In the last two weeks, Shawn had proven himself to be an invaluable asset in putting their sprawling estate back together. From setting up Colin's new kitchen in one of the former servant cottages over repairing leaking roofs to helping pick out a sturdy second hand hoverglider so they didn't have to entirely rely on the Psions Guild for transport - he knew a little about everything and was very good at finding proper textbooks and guides when he was clueless.

Colin huffed unhappily. They all had enjoyed the idea of having a functioning pool. The beach was great for bathing, but - as Colin had said it - a pool was such a civilized luxury item. And they had the damn thing; they just had to somehow get it to work.

Yaden smiled at his husband reassuringly. "Pipes will be made of metal, right?" he said. "Let me see what I can find."

Shawn opened his mouth to say something polite in the line of 'Sir, I really don't want to trouble you with…' but then shut it again, much to Yaden amusement. The slave was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that Yaden didn't mind at all working hard and helping with menial tasks. He was slowly getting there, though, and had stopped arguing.

Extending his senses into the ground of the island was by now as easy as breathing to Yaden. He felt familiar with every rock and grain of sand. The island had become his home so quickly he could hardly imagine that he had ever lived somewhere else. He followed the bright trail of metal plumbing running from the pump through the ground underneath their feet, walking along it. It didn't take him long at all to find the spot where the pressure inside the pipe changed from the even feeling of water to something else. That something else eluded his mental touch, though.

"Found it." He reported. "Must be organic matter blocking it, I can't move it." He tapped his foot on the ground, right here, about four meters down."

Shawn eyed the ground. "Anything else running through here, sir?" he asked.

The 'sir' was one thing he couldn't get the man to drop. Shawn had explained patiently and very seriously that Mrs. Eve would have his balls if he ever dared to call his masters anything less. Yaden believed him.

"You mean like cables or other pipes? Not that I can see." Yaden answered.

"Could you open it up then so we can reach the pipes, sir?" Shawn suggested. He was quickly learning how to put Yaden's psionic talents to use in their repair projects.

"Sure." Yaden agreed. "You may want to turn of the pump, though, or we'll have a lot of water on our hands and I'm afraid I can't control that."

Shawn went back to the pump. "Water is off, sir." He called.

Yaden was just about to start shifting the stone tiles away that lay atop the spot he was trying to reach, when a polite mental knock from a Psions' Guild operator interrupted him. He accepted the call and immediately the firm, professional mental voice of the man came into his mind.

\--Sir Yaden? Your presence is urgently requested in the Phoenix Knight Tower. There has been an emergency. Please also bring your squire.--

"Shit." Yaden cursed and then thought back. --I'll get my squire. We'll be ready for port in a few minutes.--

\--I will stay alert for your okay to port.-- The operator acknowledged and put the connection on stand-by.

"Trouble?" Colin asked, having observed his sudden change in expression.

Yaden nodded. "Yeah, emergency mission it looks like." He answered and then turned to Shawn. "We'll have to finish this another time." He apologized.

Shawn smiled. "Sir, I'd never presume that fixing the pool is more important than the safety of the Empire. I have plenty of other work."

"Right. I'll go grab Ivan." Yaden said and then quickly kissed Colin. "I have no idea when we'll be back so don't wait on us with dinner."

He was relieved when Colin reacted with a laugh. "You sure are great in making me feel like the housewife left behind." He said with a grin and grabbed Yaden more firmly before he could leave. His kiss was anything but quick and left Yaden tingling all over. "Just so you remember why you need to come home in one piece." Colin smirked with a suggestive wiggle of one eyebrow.

"You bet I will." Yaden promised a little breathlessly.

Then he hurried around the mansion and up to the little cottages where they lived. Yaden found Ivan and Myriam where he had left them earlier, sitting at the table under the huge old olive tree, studying under the patient but relentless supervision of Darren.

Ivan had been heaped with all sorts of lessons he was to study to become a proper squire. Things like etiquette, law, history and culture. After all, he represented the Emperor and he needed to do it well. He did his work without any of the complaints Yaden voiced when he was required to read anything, and judging from the lack of response for the Phoenix Knight Tower education team, he was doing well.

It was Darren who had suggested that Myriam should join him in his studies. After all, she now was a Dracon without any of the extensive schooling a noble girl her age would normally have received by now. Her father had taught her how to read and write and do basic math, luckily, so she didn't have to start at zero. She hadn't exactly been thrilled by the dry subjects until Ivan explained that she should count herself lucky she was getting to start so early since it meant she wouldn't have to study it when she eventually became a squire of Yaden, too.

The idea had thoroughly startled Yaden. He had certainly not planned to ever make his newly adopted daughter a squire of his, but Myriam had been utterly thrilled by the idea and was now studying with single minded stubbornness, gnawing her way through any lessons Darren gave her with amazing speed.

All three of them looked up curiously when Yaden came into view.

"Ivan, we have a mission." Yaden said. "Are you ready to go?"

It was quite impressive how quickly Ivan turned from diligent student to excitedly bouncing adventure addict. He dropped his pen and got to his feet faster than Yaden could blink.

"Sure, boss, ready to go!"

Yaden chuckled at his eagerness.

"Can I come, too?" Myriam asked with bright eyes, already perfecting the puppy look that worked best on Yaden.

"No, love." He said gently.

"But I am a much stronger psion than Ivan!" Myriam argued.

Yaden nodded seriously. "Yes, which is one of the reasons you can't come. You have even less control over your powers than he has. You need a lot more practice."

His argument was more than valid. Yaden was glad that he had raised another small island from the sea to the south, which was just bare rock for them to use for training. They had only had two training session which included Myriam so far, but both would have been disastrous in any other environment. Her fire was exceptionally hot and her control over it was tenuous at best.

If she had been a puppy she would have hung her ears. She looked so sad it wrenched at Yaden's heart. "I know." She whispered unhappily.

Yaden quickly went to her and hugged her. "Love, you just started training. Give yourself some time." He told her, gently nudging her with his nose. "I know you will practice and get better. And do a bit of growing up. When I think it is safe for you and for us to join us, I promise I will take you on a mission."

She leaned against him. "I just want to make things right." She said earnestly. "Help people like you do."

"And you will." He smiled at her encouragingly.

His trust in her seemed to help as she sat up straighter and squared her shoulders. "Next time we train I want to try the sausage exercise." She announced.

Yaden smiled. "Sure." He had no doubt that she wasn't anywhere near ready to succeed, but wouldn't keep her from trying. He gently kissed her brow and then turned back to Ivan. "Ready for port?" he asked.

Ivan nodded, rolling his shoulders.

It only took a brief mental signal for the Psions Guild operator to port them to the circle in the Phoenix Knight Tower.

"Are you really going to take her on a mission?" Ivan asked as they exited the porter room.

"When she is ready, yes."

Ivan grumbled something unintelligible. "She's only eleven. Don't you think she is too young to risk her life for the Empire?"

The protectiveness Yaden heard in Ivan's voice gladdened him, but the sentiment didn't change his opinion. "I was five when I first fought to protect people from danger. After that I never stopped. I would never ask her to do it, but if she wants to I will not stop her either. A child feels just as much compassion and the need to act as any adult. You just have to ensure that it is an adult who carries the responsibility and that the child will never believe a failure was her fault."

Ivan still looked doubtful, but now it seemed more like his mulish stubbornness to Yaden than any valid argument. The fact that his friend remained silent confirmed this.

They quickly made their way to General Hamilton's office to find out what emergency was on the menu. When the arrived, the door to the office stood open. A dark robed priest was stalking back and forth in front of the general's desk while General Hamilton himself looked like he was suffering from a severe migraine. From he amount of elaborate embroidery on the priest's robes, Yaden guessed he was pretty high ranking.

"Finally!" The priest exclaimed when Yaden cautiously knocked on the door frame. When he turned around to them, though, he hissed angrily. "That isn't him!"

General Hamilton rubbed his square chin. To Yaden it was obvious his commander was desperately trying to keep his cool. "No, your eminence, that is not Sir Relais. I'm afraid your problem is not the only one we have to deal with currently." He got up and walked around his desk. "If you will excuse us for a moment, your eminence, I will be right back with you." He made shooing gestures towards Yaden and then joined them in the corridor, firmly closing the door on the outraged priest.

"Trouble, sir?" Yaden asked.

The general grunted. "Yes, but not your trouble. This is a diplomatic mess so something for Sir Relais to deal with." He replied. "You get your own trouble. Right, let's make this quick. Some morons of House Castella's house army have discovered some sort of alien artefact on some godforsaken moon. Of course they had nothing better to do than haul it back to their base. The thing has gone berserk and apparently is doing all sorts of nasty stuff. So now they come crawling to us for help. Which - in his infinite wisdom - the emperor has decided to grant. You'll get a port to that base, check out that thing and if you consider it a relevant threat you are going to destroy it. Don't take any chances. Don't let the military types there distract you from your work. Understood?"

"Aye, sir." Both Yaden and Ivan nodded.

"Then get to it." General Hamilton turned back to his office, grumbling under his breath.

"Sounds straight forward enough." Ivan commented as they hurried back to the porter room, sounding eager.

It did, which was precisely what worried Yaden. He threw a sideways glance at Ivan. Noticing his look, Ivan blinked back, confused for a moment, but then he caught on to Yaden's train of thought.

"Oh." He muttered. "We better be careful then, eh?"


	2. Chapter 2

Ivan's first impression of the military base was blaring alarm sirens. He had expected a large military base would have a porting circle, but they arrived on the flat roof of what looked like a small storage building.

One look at the ground level told Ivan clearly why this spot had been chosen by the teleport operator - the place was in complete chaos. The base was nestled into the furthest recess of a deep canyon, the building they were standing on was at outer edge of the base. From here, they had a great view over the multitude of running personnel, burning buildings, explosions from mortar fire, great lumbering shapes barely visible through the smoke - it looked like a warzone from a movie.

It reminded Ivan of an anthill after someone had dropped a burning branch into it. Anita had been fond of doing this and always laughed and clapped gleefully when she had been about four years old. Soon after that she had discovered how much more fun it was to torture slaves and her brother.

"What the fuck…?" Ivan muttered. Extending his psionic senses like Yaden had taught him didn't get him any clearer view of the battlefield. Just that there was plenty of fire that would bend to his will. And something else. Something strangely uncomfortable which he instinctively shied away from. That was probably the alien artefact General Hamilton had talked about. He looked at Yaden for guidance and found his friend deeply concentrated, his eyes unfocused as his senses obviously swept the carnage before them.

"That is… strange…" Yaden said after a while, his brow furrowing in confusion.

Ivan was pretty sure the stronger psion had detected the same presence he had. "What is that?" he asked.

"I'm not sure." Yaden answered, rubbing at his nose thoughtfully. "It does seem to have a metal component but none I have ever encountered before and I can't get a grip on it, it's like my touch just slides off it. I've never seen anything like it." He drew a deep breath. "Let's find whoever is in charge of this mess and see if we can get a report on what is happening. That over there looks like some kind of commando post." He pointed further out of the canyon were several jeeps and armoured vehicles stood together in a defensive cluster. "I'd say someone has completely lost control of the situation."

They both jumped off the roof and made their way over to the improvised command post at a fast trot. That they weren't stopped by the few soldiers running about wasn't exactly reassuring, Ivan thought. Only when they came near the vehicles did someone finally notice them.

"Stop!" A wild eyed, panicked soldier shouted at them from his cover behind a jeep and waved his assault rifle threateningly. Or maybe his hands were shaking that badly. Ivan wasn't entirely sure.

"I'm Sir Yaden of the Phoenix Knights." Yaden yelled back. "I need to speak to however is in command here."

The soldier squinted at them from under his helmet. Yaden didn't wait for a reply and instead continued on his way. This time, Ivan stayed behind his knight. Blocking bullets was more Yaden's specialty. Luckily the soldier seemed to recognize Yaden as he suddenly changed from panic to gaping awe and just stared at them as they passed him by.

It wasn't hard to spot the highest ranking officer in the group of men clustered around a map spread on the hood of one of the jeeps. He was the one who looked most harried and who everyone else was staring at for guidance. Ivan recognized the insignia on his Castella House uniform as that of a Colonel.

Yaden apparently did too as he greeted the man. "Colonel. I'm Sir Yaden of the Phoenix Knights. The Emperor sends me to deal with your mess."

Not exactly a rulebook greeting. As far as Ivan had been instructed by the training teams of the Phoenix Knight Tower, they were supposed to always be polite, friendly and helpful. But as usual, Yaden was doing things his way. The Colonel looked quite hostile himself so Ivan felt like Yaden's approach was warranted. And of course, General Hamilton had explicitly ordered them not to take any shit from the military out here.

Whoever had called for assistance from the Phoenix Knight Tower, it hadn't been this Colonel, as became quickly apparent by his reply: "There seems to be a misunderstanding here, sir," he growled with barely contained anger, "we have not asked for the assistance of any imperial personnel."

Ouch, Ivan thought. Calling a Phoenix Knight 'imperial personnel' maybe wasn't factually wrong, but it also was a sure way to royally piss of said Phoenix Knight. He couldn't help but grin as Yaden suddenly bristled with fury. Even though he was nearly a head shorter than the Colonel he managed to exude an amazing amount of threat as he cleaned forward.

"There obviously is a misunderstanding here," he hissed, "YOU are here to assist ME! And you will do that by giving me a full report on the situation right now!"

For a brief moment the Colonel looked cowed, but then he puffed but like an insulted cock. "This is a Castella military base and you have no authority here!" he snarled.

Ivan squeezed his eyes closed painfully. What a blistering fool. No wonder the situation was so fucked up if he was in command.

Yaden obviously agreed. Ivan guessed that under other circumstances, he might have tried to reason with the Colonel a little longer, but people were dying and an unknown threat was gaining ground with every minute they wasted. With a wave of Yaden's hand a sizeable rock hit the back of the Colonel's head, knocking him out. He dropped like a sack of potatoes.

"Now," Yaden turned to the rest of the panicked officers who were now staring at him with huge, frightened eyes, "anyone else feel a need to argue?"

The men were staring at him like shocked rabbits in a headlight. It made Ivan wonder when he had crossed the line from 'scared by weird stuff' to 'hell yeah, let's kick some ass'. Probably when he had roared back at that demon bull.

"I need a report on what has happened here." Yaden repeated, now calmer and less threatening.

A young Captain finally pulled his shit together and nodded shakily. "Yes, sir. Erh…" he began haltingly.

"When did the artefact arrive here, when did it start attacking the base?" Yaden prompted him.

The clear questions seemed to help focus the Captain. "It was brought in early afternoon, yesterday. I didn't see it, but apparently it was just a huge lump of metal." He explained. "It was taken to the underground research facilities. As far as we can determine it became active tonight. We have no idea what happened in the laboratories, but we assume all scientists must be dead now. It kills all organic life it encounters. But it… uh… it takes over machines. It… it infests them…"

"The artefact itself is still underground?" Yaden asked.

The Captain first nodded and then shrugged. "As far as we can tell."

"Right." Yaden turned and again looked over the chaos of battle and once more Ivan was sure his friend was sweeping the region with his psionic senses, only this time he was probably scanning underground as well. It didn't take long.

"I want you to pull back all of your troops!" Yaden commanded. "Evacuate the base and withdraw to at least a mile away from here. I'm not sure how great collateral damage will be but I expect a lot."

"Yes, sir!"

With clear orders the officers suddenly all became active, getting on their com channels. What happened next couldn't be called an orderly retreat, but at least it was fast, with soldiers running for their lives.

Yaden didn't wait for them. "Let's go." He grimly said. "Let's get as many of them out of this alive as we can."

"Do we have a plan?" Ivan asked as they walked back towards the base, while at the same time gathering heat in his hands and reaching out for the various fires burning everywhere, touching them, stroking them, making them his own.

"We cover the retreat, then we try to get closer." Yaden answered. "If possible I want to have a look at that thing. It feels like it is at least resistant to psi and if it infects machines on top of that it is a serious threat we need to know more about."

Getting close to whatever it was didn't sound exactly inviting to Ivan, but he grinned nonetheless. After all, doing the dangerous stuff was their job.

In front of them, a small group of soldiers emerged from the smoke, carrying and supporting wounded comrades. They were desperately trying to duck from a hail of bullets, tracing them from an unseen source. Next to Ivan, Yaden took up his combat stance, feet planted wide and firm. With an angry wave of his hands the bullets were forced down in midflight, dropping harmlessly to the ground. The soldiers rushed past them without paying them much attention. Then another shape emerged from the smoke.

At first Ivan thought it was more soldiers, using one of the jeeps for a faster escape, but the vehicle was driving slowly and when it became more clearly visible, Ivan understood what the young Captain had meant with 'infected'. It had originally been a lightly armoured jeep, but now parts of it were overgrown with misshapen lumps of some shiny black substance that looked like wet metal. A soldier was still in the driver's seat, but he was clearly dead, impaled by a long spike. The machine gun mounted on top of the vehicle was waving from side to side, searching for targets. It spotted them and opened fire immediately.

Once more Yaden easily deflected the bullets. Ivan quickly decided that his flame sabres wouldn't be much help against this target. He focused more heat into his hands and then sent a concentrated stream of very hot fire against the front of the jeep where he knew the motor was. The jeep tried to accelerate, but Ivan burned through too quickly. When his flames reached the tank it exploded, violently throwing the jeep to the side.

The fleeing soldiers were now only a trickle of men as they moved deeper into the base.

"The entrance to the underground part is at the back of the canyon." Yaden said, his mind clearly focused on scanning the ground. "I am not getting a very clear picture of it." He added, sounding troubled.

They heard more vehicles move in the smoke, but they dodged past them, trying not to draw any attention.

"This stuff is so strange…" Yaden muttered more to himself than Ivan as they got closer to the back of the canyon. "I can almost touch it and then it just slides away under my grip. Maybe with more practise…"

With Yaden so distracted Ivan tried to stay extra vigilant against surprise attacks. Still it was Yaden who suddenly shouted out a warning and violently flung Ivan to the side.

The smoke was so thick here that he had mistaken the huge, silent thing standing in front of them as a part of a building. Only when it moved did he realize it was actually an amalgam of several vehicles, mashed and glued together by the black substance to form a new, amazingly ugly whole. It loomed over Yaden like a giant over a child. A hail of bullets from various guns mounted all over the thing rained down on Yaden, but all of them harmlessly fell to the ground around him as Yaden deflected them.

The attack abruptly ended. For a moment Ivan thought that it was Yaden's doing somehow, but then the thing moved forward, raising one huge appendage made of a jeep and what might have once been a helicopter. Ivan watched in numb shock as it brought down this giant club to squash his friend.

The swing stopped in midair as Yaden flung up his hands in a defensive gesture. He was gripping the metal, Ivan realized, and holding it back. Ivan frantically tried to come up with some way to help his friend, but unlike the jeep he had attacked earlier, this monstrosity had no discernible weak point where he could hurt it.

While he was still thinking, though, the black metal started to move suddenly, it slithered all over the surface of the towering construct and Ivan watched with horror as it tipped forward in slow motion, Yaden more and more losing his grip on it.

Desperately Ivan gathered flames in his hands to hurl at the thing and maybe at least distract it, but it was already too late. With terrible force, the thing crashed down on Yaden, burying him under tons of metal.

Ivan loosened his fire against it with a scream of rage. This wasn't supposed to happen. This simply couldn't be true.

The thing groaned as metal strained, trying to lift itself up again. Ivan didn't care. If his knight was truly dead he didn't plan on getting out of here alive either.

Only when the metal starting tearing and bending and violently compacting around the black substance did he realize that it wasn't moved by whatever was controlling it - it was Yaden's power ripping into it. With an ear splitting screech the monstrous thing folded in on itself, compacting to an uneven ball of metal and black stuff, coming to rest next to a seriously battered looking Yaden. He was kneeling on the ground, one arm wrapped around himself, panting, while his other was balled to a fist.

Ivan rushed over to his friend. "Yaden? Are you… what the fuck…?" he asked, not sure how the knight had survived being hit.

Yaden groaned, his face pale with pain as he raised his head to look at Ivan slightly unfocused. "Change of plans." He rasped. "We kill it as quickly as possible."

He tried to stand up and Ivan quickly supported him when he looked like he would crumble again.

"Rips at least cracked." Yaden explained, hanging on to Ivan.

With Colin's wrath hanging over his head if anything happened to Yaden, Ivan wondered how he could convince Yaden to withdraw from this battle. "So what now?" he asked, trying to win some time. "I don't really have any idea how to attack that… whatever it is…"

"If we can't attack it directly, we'll use the environment against it." Yaden tapped the ground with his foot, raising a slab of concrete underneath them and then used that like he always did with rock to hover them up.

Ivan had no idea what he was planning to do, but from Yaden's grim expression he judged that his friend wasn't in a mood to explain either. The slab swiftly rose into the air until they were well above the rim of the canyon and the base below them just a collection of toy sized buildings jutting out of the smoke.

"Are you sure you are in shape to do whatever you plan to do?" Ivan asked his friend, who was still leaning on him.

"I have to." Yaden replied. "We can't allow this to spread or we might never contain it."

Ivan didn't like it, but Yaden was right - it was their job to do the impossible. "Anything I can do to help?"

"Yes," Yaden nodded, "get a connection open to Nabuco Prime and make sure they have an emergency port ready for us. I'm not sure I will still be able to keep us hovering when I'm done."

Loudly thinking a mental image still felt really odd to Ivan, but he had trained it plenty by now and so he got a quick answer first from an operator and then Nabuco Prime himself, confirming that an immediate port was ready whenever they needed it.

When he turned his attention back to Yaden, he found him deep in concentration, moving his arms in slow gestures that reminded Ivan of Colin kneading bread dough. Only when he looked down again did he realize what Yaden was doing. The edges of the canyon were folding down over the base, rolling it into a gigantic ball of rock. Even though Ivan had theoretically known that his friend was capable of immense feats, observing him doing this was a whole different matter. It made Ivan shiver, thinking that such a small human being could literary move mountains with nothing but his will. It also made him realize that he needed to train a lot more and a lot harder.

"How is he going to lift that…?" he whispered, not even realizing that he had spoken aloud until Yaden answered.

"Not lift," he growled, "it's going down."

And then he slowly brought his hands down, stretched out in front of him, palms down, like he was pushing on something.

Beneath them the ground groaned and impossible masses of rock and soil moved.

Yaden was pushing the rolled up ball of rock with the alien thing inside it down towards the hot core of the planet, Ivan realized.

Sweat beaded his friend's brow and he was trembling with the effort.

Ivan desperately wished that they had gotten further in their channelling practise and that he could lend him what little energy he had stored, but all he could do was watch.

When the concrete slab they were standing on started wobbling, Ivan was tempted to call in that port, but Yaden looked like he wasn't done yet so he waited a little longer. Only when his friend suddenly slumped forward, utterly exhausted and they violently tilted sideways, did he have them ported.


	3. Chapter 3

Ivan jumped the medi tech as soon as the young man emerged from the treatment room Yaden had been taken to when they arrived back at the Phoenix Knight Tower. His friend had been unconscious, pale as death and bleeding from his nose.

"How his he?" Ivan demanded.

The tech didn't look too worried which served to calm Ivan a little. "We've popped him into the healing tank." He explained. "Two broken ribs, a cracked collar bone and minor mana burn. He'll be as good as new in a few hours." He eyed Ivan with a deep frown. "He's doing much better than you usually do when he brings you in, so no reason to get fuzzy."

With a relieved sigh, Ivan relaxed slightly. With a little luck, Yaden would be home for dinner and Colin would never learn of this little mishap. That Yaden had only a slight mana burn after what Ivan had witnessed him do to that canyon was rather disturbing, though. For the first time, it made Ivan wonder what exactly were the limits of Yaden's talents. And how he could get good enough to keep up with his knight.

"General Hamilton sent a message." The medi tech informed him curtly. "He wants your report straight away."

Of course the general would want to know what had taken out one of his more powerful knights.

Ivan managed to suppress the urge to tell the tech to take good care of Yaden while he was gone. Instead, he just nodded and headed out of the infirmary to make his way to General Hamilton's office.

In his mind, he was trying to sort what he should tell the general. After all, they hadn't really seen much. Then again, the general had access to a much wider range of intelligence on all sorts of alien artefacts, so chances were good that he might know more about the strange black substance that had infected the machines of the base. If anything like it had been encountered before.

With his mind on other things, he wasn't paying too much attention on where he was going and suddenly ran into another person, hurrying in the opposite direction.

He was already opening his mouth to apologize and quickly be on his way again when he realized that the man he had nearly toppled over was the slimy Dracon who had eyed him in the elevator on his first day as Yaden's squire. He hadn't seen the noble since then and pretty much forgotten about him. Apparently, he had left a more permanent impression with the man, who now smirked at him.

"Well, well, who do we have here…?" he drawled.

Normally Ivan would have been delighted to use this opportunity to teach this Dracon a few lessons about how to treat a slave, but right now he was in a hurry so he just growled: "Back off, I'm on official Phoenix Knight business."

The noble's smirk widened to a grin. "Oh really? What would a pretty boy like you be doing for the Phoenix Knight Tower? Let me take a guess…" He tapped his chin thoughtfully, completely overacting the gesture. "Someone urgently needs a blowjob from that sweet mouth of yours?"

Ivan hissed and flames ignited in both his hands, racing up his arms almost to his shoulders. He wouldn't take this again. From anybody.

"I said fuck OFF!" he snarled.

His fire seemed to impress the Dracon quite a bit. Suddenly his smirk fell off his face and was replaced by a mix of outrage and fear. "How dare you!" he yelped.

Ivan had a hard time resisting the urge to just fry the bastard to a crisp when suddenly another deep, rumbling voice interrupted them.

"Is there a problem here?"

They both turned to look and Ivan's flames extinguished as quickly as they had appeared when he realized who exactly was standing there in the corridor, tall, broad and grizzled as a mountain, his cigar firmly wedged into the corner of his mouth. Sir Rage looked exactly like on the posters and collectible mugs. Only much bigger and much more dangerous.

The noble obviously was delighted with the sudden turn of events. "Sir Rage!" he exclaimed. "What a luck you came by! This slave was threatening…"

"I'm not talking to you, dumbass." The most famous Phoenix Knight cut him short rudely and looked at Ivan. "That little shit giving you trouble, Ivan?"

Ivan just gaped at him open mouthed, his brain trying and failing to process the fact that Sir Rage apparently not just knew his name but knew him well enough to recognize him.

The Dracon, on the other hand, was catching on much faster and suddenly paled considerably. "This is an unfortunate misunderstanding." He addressed Sir Rage and raised his hands defensively.

"Oh really?" The hulking Phoenix Knight was a lot more menacing in person than he looked in the movies and in those he was quite scary. "Looks to me like you were harassing Sir Yaden's squire just there. Looks to me like I should be splattering your innards all over this corridor, slimeball!"

Imagining being on the receiving end of that dressing down was quite sobering. It helped Ivan to somehow catch up with this sudden turn of events. "I'm sure the fucking idiot was just planning to get lost, isn't that so?" Ivan threw the Dracon bastard a lifeline.

"Yes!" The man was sweating with fear and Ivan couldn't help but feel sorry for him now. "I apologize for any inconvenience I have caused, Sir Rage." He hastily bowed to the Phoenix Knight. "Sir… erh… Ivan…?"

Ivan generously waved him off and the Dracon fled down the corridor without a glance back, apparently expecting to be shot by Sir Rage's famous blaster cannon any moment. The Phoenix Knight, however, ignored him and turned back to Ivan with a huge grin plastered over his face, showing clearly that his temper had just been for show.

"So you are Yaden's new squire, eh?" He greeted Ivan, gripping his hand in one of his own massive paws and giving his a bone crunching squeeze. "Pleased to meet you, boy."

Since he hadn't been sure whether to kneel or bow or simply faint, Ivan was quite thankful for the crushing handshake as it helped him stay somewhat grounded in the presence of this legend.

"It's a great honor to meet you, sir." He managed to say without his voice squeaking like he thought it must.

Sir Rage studied him more closely and Ivan resisted the urge to try and shrink away and instead straightened his back.

"I was rather relieved to hear Yaden had gotten someone to guard his back." Sir Rage commented approvingly. "Good kid, he is, but not the best in a hot fight."

"I try my best, sir." Ivan answered, keenly aware of the fact that his knight was currently in a healing tank while he was still walking and how badly that might reflect on him.

"So where is the kid?" Sir Rage asked the dreaded question.

For a moment Ivan was sorely tempted to make up something, but then he caught himself. He couldn't lie to Sir Rage. That would be just too fucking rude. "He's in a healing tank. We've just come back from a mission." He answered truthfully, hoping that Sir Rage wouldn't blame him too much for his failure to protect Yaden.

But the elder Phoenix Knight chuckled jovially. "Don't look so guilty, kid." He told Ivan and patted his back with the force a grizzly bear might have used to maul a victim. "That's a perfectly normal place for a Phoenix Knight to be after a mission. God knows I must have spent a few months of my life in such tanks."

Ivan somehow managed not to be dropped to his knees by such violent good will.

Sir Rage nodded, looking satisfied. "Well, I shouldn't be keeping you either, eh? I'm sure you have places to be and don't need an old man chewing your ear off." He said and made a shooing gesture with his huge hand.

He was right, of course, and Ivan had no idea what else to say to prolong his presence in the company of this man who he, like every kid in the Empire, had always idolized. So he said: "Yes, sir." And gave the knight one of those sloppy salutes Yaden always directed at General Hamilton, hoping that it was some sort of Phoenix Knight tradition and that he would look competent knowing it.

It was quite gratifying when Sir Rage returned the salute in kind.

A few minutes later, Ivan knocked on the door of General Hamilton's office where he had arrived without any further mishaps.

"Come in." The general's voice called immediately. He was sitting behind his desk, looking somewhat calmer than when they had seen him earlier with the priest present. "Ah, Ivan, good."

It was the first time Ivan was seeing the commander of the Phoenix Knights without Yaden present and he was a little nervous about it, but the general obviously had no time for such sentiments.

"Report." He ordered calmly.

Ivan tried to keep his report as exact and short as possible. When he started describing the black substance which they thought was the artefact's influence, General Hamilton perked up.

"Shiny black, you say and almost with a life of its own?" he asked, starting to rummage through the many folders on his desk at the same time.

Ivan nodded. "Yes, sir. Yaden said it resisted his psionic influence even though it felt metallic to him."

"Mmh." The general pulled stack of photos from one of the folders. "Did it look like this?" he asked.

It took Ivan only one look at the top photo to nod again. It showed what looked like it had once been a shuttle but was now overgrown and pierced with the same substance they had encountered. "What is that stuff, sir?" he asked.

"It means that artefact was of N'Bosoti origin." General Hamilton said with a grim frown. "What looks like some ancient artefact is often just a disguise for some nasty trap. Their tech is so advanced that for us it is still pretty much incomprehensible. Infecting our tech and turning it against us is one of their favourite tricks."

"N'Bosoti?" Ivan blinked at the general in confusion. "I thought they were defeated at the siege of Far'Gesh."

The great battle had been mentioned in passing in his history lessons when he was still a boy. Some sort of alien force had laid siege to the Youh'Kai home world, but Saint Cornelius had defeated them, working one of the greatest church confirmed miracles in the history of humanity.

General Hamilton snorted derisively. "There is a whole race of those monsters our there. At Far'Gesh one of their fleets was eradicated but they are far from defeated as a whole." He rubbed his face tiredly. "This is strictly need-to-know, Ivan, but I think you and Yaden do need to know. The N'Bosoti are still a menace. They are what the Youh'Kai call an 'elder race'. They believe these creatures were the first created by their gods. I'll have a briefing for both of you prepared so you'll will know what you are dealing with if you run into them again."

Ivan nodded numbly, trying to absorb this revelation. Elder race? Fucking interstellar monsters? And he had thought demons and magic were exotic. What would be next?

"So what happened with the artefact?" General Hamilton asked unfazed. Apparently this was just business as usual to him, so Ivan quickly forces his own mind back into motion.

He told the general how Yaden had folded up the canyon and pushed the whole thing down into the hot core of the planet. He was rewarded with a nasty chuckle from General Hamilton.

"Leave it to Yaden to find some way to rip those bastards a new one, anyway." He commented happily. "How is Yaden doing?"

"The medi tech says he'll be good as new in a few hours." Ivan answered.

"Good. Take him home when he gets out. I'll expect a written report from both of you in the next few days. We'll take care of the clean up with the Castella military." General Hamilton nodded at Ivan in dismissal. "Good work, kid."

Ivan waited until he was outside in the corridor again, before he allowed himself to smile. The general was happy with his work. He was doing well. It felt fucking awesome. Even if there were obviously a million things he still needed to learn about and another few million hours of training he would need to log to get good enough to do this job properly.


End file.
